Finger Lakes, NY

The past couple of years, we have taken a trip with Ryan's family to see Eric play football for Dartmouth. 2 years ago, we went to New York City for the Columbia game. Last year we went to Hanover, NH for the Dartmouth Homecoming game -- also against Columbia. This year we decided to go to the UPenn game in Philadelphia and the Cornell game in Ithaca, NY.

Ithaca is in a beautiful region of New York near the "Finger Lakes" -- which are appropriately named.

After some investigation of the area, I learned that there were two main attractions... wineries and gorges/waterfalls.

Ryan and I, along with his parents, flew into Syracuse on Thursday and spent the night there. We stayed at the Embassy Suites that reminded me of the Opryland Hotel that my family stayed in when I was a kid. The rooms opened to a huge indoor courtyard. It was a very nice hotel with a great "free" breakfast.

Friday morning we set out toward Ithaca, taking the "long route" down the west side of Cayuga Lake. The Cayuga Lake Region has several wineries that make up the Cayuga Wine Trail. There are at least 15 wineries in the area, along with restaurants and other attractions.

As we were driving along the scenic route, we passed through several cute, small towns. We stopped for pictures in the cutest, Skaneateles which is at the top of Skaneateles Lake. It had great views of the lake right on HWY 20.

I decided to just pick two wineries to stop at so that we could also see some of the scenery and waterfalls too. The first winery was the Thirsty Owl Wine Company. I picked it for two reasons: One, the name... I know, cheesy, but the Chi Omega in me is still drawn to those darn Owls; Two, it was one of the few wineries that was RIGHT on the lake.

Gorgeous view from Highway 89. The Thirsty Owl is the house in the middle.

The Wine Man Matthew pours our glasses. You are supposed to only taste 5 wines but he wanted us to try more than that so we tried about 7 or 8. Matthew was very knowledgeable and entertaining.

We really enjoyed the Thirsty Owl wines, especially their award winning Reislings. It was a great first exprience at a winery.
We also liked the Syrah that we tasted so we purchased a bottle that we drank over the course of the next two days of our trip.


After the Thirsty Owl, we stopped at the Cayuga Lake Creamery. They make all their ice creams homemade and had some interesting flavors, including....
"Jalepeno Popper"... yes, you read that right... jalepeno popper ice cream. It was an interesting flavor but not a bad flavor. (Ryan ate and enjoyed his whole cone)...and "Purple Cow" -- Black raspberry with Chocolate chunks.

After Ice Cream, we stopped at the Americana Vineyards. I picked this Winery because it was on our route and because it had a Cafe that is open year round. This made a perfect stop for lunch, though we had dessert first. We ate a nice lunch in the Crystal Cafe and then did another tasting.
Pear/Brie Salad and Open faced turkey
Chili and Chicken Fried Steak

We were not as impressed with the Americana Wines but it was still a nice stop. They had two beautiful chocolate labs on the property that were so friendly.

After wrapping up our mini wine tour, we headed toTaughannock Falls State Park. There is an awesome waterfall at this park. We drove to the overlook point and saw the fall from up top...
... then drove down the road for a 3/4 mile walk to view the fall from the bottom. The walk through the changing leaves and mini waterfalls was awesome.

After Taughannock Falls, we headed to Ithaca to see Buttermilk Falls. We parked at the parking area and decided to try to make the walk to the base of the falls. It was a really pretty walk with lots of small waterfalls and amazing rock formations that had been created by the water.

As we started the walk, we realized it was all downhill, which meant all uphill on the way back. And, it was getting late with not much daylight left (stupid time change makes it get dark at 5pm). We decided to turn around after talking to a couple we passed on the trail. They informed us you could park at the base of the falls as well so we headed there.
Friday night we ate dinner at a local Italian restaurant and then went to visit Eric at his hotel. It's been a tough season for Dartmouth football -- they currently have not won a game with only 2 left. Not the senior year we hoped for but Eric has played well. It was nice to visit with Eric and his teammate for a little while.

Saturday we took a quick tour of Cornell's campus. As I think I said after visiting Philly, the beauty of these cities and campuses is just amazing. There is so much that is so old (and some new) that its just awesome to see. And the colors of the trees and the leaves were something we don't get much of in Texas.

There is a beautiful pedestrian suspension bridge over a large gorge on the Cornell campus. We walked across the bridge and in a loop around that side of campus to get some amazing views of the gorge and waterfall. We also made a quick stop at the SAE house that was situated on the top of a hill.

After the game on Saturday we headed back to Syracuse for the night and flew out Sunday morning. It was a nice, quick trip to a neat part of the country. Definitely recommended!